Minus sign on suppressed parts within assy

[engmechs]

Hi all,

My supervisor told me to generate a solidworks assy in a certain format - that is to have a multi-configuration assy for presenting it in different stages. However, there is one thing that bugs him - he doesn't like the minus sign (inside the bracket on feature manager tree area) of an suppressed item.

I didn't really pay attention to this before, but don't know how to get rid of it. In some config., it was not there, but it existed in some configs. Apparently, if this was not fixed, it may give problems in future, such as merging assembly together.

Please help out on this.

engmechs

 

[MadMango]

You are getting the unconstrained "-" symbol due to suppressing a part higher in the Feature Manager hierarchy. Since a part is now suppressed, any associated Mates now have nothing to reference to. In order to get rid of all the "-" symbols, you would have to change your Mates in your Assembly from part-part in the Assembly to part-Assembly planes.

I hope that makes sense.

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

Have you read faq731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

 

[CorBlimeyLimey]

I've often wondered about that myself. After some quick tests I concluded that the minus sign would appear if the component being suppressed had another component mated to it ... even if that other component were also suppressed.

Then I discovered that with a simple two component assy, the second component would have the minus sign attached if it were suppressed, unsuppressed and then suppressed again. The minus sign did not appear with the first suppression though. ???

So I then concluded that I did not know what the heck was going on and just ignored it. It does not appear to have created problems so far.

 

[engmechs]

Thanks MadMango, for your suggestion. That is certainly one way to get around the problem.

One strange thing I noticed: after I got frustated about getting rid of the minus sign. I opened the file afterwards, & found the minus signs were gone!
Possibly that is a bug by itself. So far, from what I had gone through, if the part is properly defined in space & suppressed afterwards, it should have no minus sign. (may get temporary minus sign in the meantime, from residue memory?!)

Had someone experienced this before? Hope this is not a fluke.

engmechs

 

[MadMango]

Try Ctrl+Q to force a Rebuild, see if that clears things up.

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

Have you read faq731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

 

[adampunch]

my understanding is that the minus sign indicates that a part is not completely located by mates. Any part that you want to rotate or slide around in an assembly will have this minus sign- there's nothing wrong with the part.

I can see how it may appear/disappear unexpectedly when suppressing and unsupressing things. hitting ctrl-Q should clear everything up.

Otherwise i'm with the other posters- suppressing the parts you mate to will also supress the mates.

 

[JMarv]

engmechs,

I see this occasionally. Parts are obviously fully constrained, but the minus sign still appears. Ctrl-Q doesn't fix it. If I suppress, then unsupress the mates in the offending part, the minus sign goes away. I've also seen as you stated: save, close, open; and all is fine.

Joe
SW Office 2006 SP5.1
P4 3.0Ghz 1GB
ATI FireGL X1

 

[Theophilus]

I think it may be a mate constraint (yikes) issue, too--perhaps related to a part or mate being suppressed by the differing configurations. Check that the mates aren't being suppressed in the part that displays the minus sign--or at least that what the mates attach to aren't being suppressed. Might just be a logical issue...



Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

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